


got it in you

by bramgreenfeld



Series: somebody to someone [3]
Category: Rise (TV 2018)
Genre: Canon Continuation, F/F, Family, Feelings, Friendship, M/M, Other Additional Tags to Be Added
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-02
Updated: 2019-04-25
Packaged: 2019-12-30 18:56:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 20,156
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18321248
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bramgreenfeld/pseuds/bramgreenfeld
Summary: One day, the sun would burn out. It was an inevitability. The world would end and humanity would cease to exist along with it, the only thing left on the planet sheets of ice and rocks. But despite knowing that, people didn’t stop moving. They didn’t give up on everything, knowing that they’d die someday. They kept going.or, stanton drama keeps going.





	1. you got it in you

**Author's Note:**

> me: start a riot is the natural end to the series there's no need to make these kids suffer anymore  
> me, months later: so that was a lie
> 
> so as i'm sure you guessed this is the sequel to somebody to someone/start a riot but it's pretty different from those works (you don't necessarily have to read them to read this!). instead of being just from jeremy's point of view, it's from four-five different characters' perspectives each chapter, the characters being jeremy and simon, jolene and harmony, clark and francis, and lexi and violet, depending on who has the braincell. it's also much more of a straightforward season 2 fic just with a 60k prologue. anyway i hope yall enjoy!!
> 
> title + chapter titles from got it in you by (you guessed it) BANNERS

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> jeremy thinks about his relationship, jolene encounters a familiar figure, clark tries to be optimistic, and lexi wonders about the future.

Summer went by quickly that year, a haze of bright sun and creaking air conditioning and days when it was too hot to go outside so they went to the movie theater and let their hands touch just enough for it to not be an accident. Part of Jeremy wished that it would stay that way forever, just the two of them together under that sensation of freedom that the season always brought. But he knew that it couldn’t last. There always came a time when the endless days seemed to get repetitive, and Jeremy had reached that point weeks ago. As much as he could hate high school sometimes, it provided some sort of structure to his life. At some point, he needed that foundation back.

But that didn’t stop him from remaining in his car for just a few moments longer, clinging to Simon’s hand like it was his last connection to those final days of freedom.  

“We have to go soon,” Simon said. He cast a worried glance at the school building. “My first period is on the other side of the building.”

“It’ll be okay,” Jeremy replied. “If this is the last time I’ll see you all day, I want to make it last.” The two of them didn’t have any classes together this year, and Simon had to get home right after school so that his parents (mostly his father, who had been watching him like a hawk since the previous year) wouldn’t worry.

Simon nodded, his dark eyes darting around quickly. They were the only ones left in the parking lot, everyone else having already gone in to try and reunite with old friends and figure out where their lockers were. There was no one around to witness the soft, slow kiss they shared. “That should hold you over,” Simon said quietly once they separated. He started to say something else, but drew back suddenly, looking distant.

“What’s up?” Jeremy asked.

Simon shrugged. “Nothing.”

“ _Simon_ ,” Jeremy said. He reached out and grabbed Simon’s hand, running his thumb over the back of it. “Tell me.”

Finally, Simon sighed. “I just...I just wish we could be more, you know?”

“Be more...what?”

Simon frowned, just slightly. He had started squeezing Jeremy’s hand tighter, but Jeremy didn’t mind it. “I don’t mean, like, in our relationship,” he said. Jeremy couldn’t help but smile at that. Even after nearly a year, he still couldn’t believe that he was actually dating this boy. “Not really, anyway. I mean...I want to be with you. Like, really be with you. The way that everyone else is with the people they love.”

Jeremy tried to ignore the way his heart picked up speed at his words. “You mean like...you want to come out?”

“Yes. No.” Simon leaned back against the seat, not looking directly at Jeremy. “I _want_ to. You know I do. But…”

Jeremy knew what he was going to say before he even had the chance to speak it out loud. “But we can’t.” Simon didn’t respond, instead looking down at their intertwined hands. “Simon, it’s okay. I don’t care. I mean, I _do_ care, but...I just want you to be happy, you know?”

“And I want you to be happy,” Simon mumbled. “Which is why I wish…” He trailed off, whatever thought he had had disappearing into the wind. “I love you,” he said instead.

“I know.” Simon mock-glared at him, and Jeremy grinned. “Sorry. I love you too. I’ll love you here in secret, and when you’re ready, I’ll love you for the world to hear. But for now…” He squeezed Simon’s hand. “I’m happy here.”

Simon had begun to smile again, and Jeremy’s heart skipped a beat at the sight of it. Simon said something, but the sound of the first period warning bell drowned him out. “What?” Jeremy asked.

“Forget it,” said Simon. “I’d better go.” He put his hand on the door handle, then turned abruptly, kissing Jeremy quickly.

“What is our thing with parking lots?” Jeremy murmured against his lips.

Simon laughed, pulling away from him. “Bye. Love you.”

“Love you too.” Jeremy watched as Simon climbed out of the car, running up to the front doors. The words that Simon had said underneath the bell, the words that Simon had thought that he hadn’t heard, were still bouncing around in his head - _Can we last like this?_

Jeremy didn’t want to think about it, but now that the idea was there, he couldn’t get rid of it. He had never really thought about his and Simon’s future, not seriously, anyway - he had always been so focused on the present, he hadn’t had room in his head for anything else. He loved Simon, he knew he did. He couldn’t imagine that ever ending. It just seemed like a certainty now -  the sky was blue, the grass was green, and Jeremy loved Simon.

But at some point, all secrets had to come out, whether it was on purpose or not. Jeremy knew that better than anyone. And he had no idea what would happen when it did. Would it be of their own free will, days, weeks, months from now? Or would they be forced out, caught together by some anonymous figure and their secret spreading through the student body of Stanton High School like a plague? What would happen then? Would Simon pull away from him, or would he push him away?

Jeremy leaned against the back of the seat, taking a deep breath. In front of him, he saw the school doors open and close, Simon disappearing into the building. Jeremy stared at the place where he had been - it was as if there was a phantom impression of him. When Jeremy closed his eyes, he could still see the outline of him, as if he had been looking at a bright light.

One day, the sun would burn out. It was an inevitability. The world would end and humanity would cease to exist along with it, the only thing left on the planet sheets of ice and rocks. But despite knowing that, people didn’t stop moving. They didn’t give up on everything, knowing that they’d die someday. They kept going.

That was the scary thing about relationships. Either they were forever or they weren’t. They ended in heartbreak or they didn’t end at all, and there was no way to know which one it would be. At this point in time, there was nothing Jeremy could do except love, and be loved in return.

And he was happy with that.

He sat up, grabbing his backpack off of the ground. Outside, the late bell rang.

He groaned. _What a great start to junior year._

***

Jolene tried not to look guilty when Mr. Mazzu asked them to pass up the essays they were supposed to write over the summer, but she could tell that he saw right through it. She couldn’t bring herself to care. Maybe she’d have actually written it if the assignment had been something other than _How did you change for the better this summer?_ Newsflash, Mr. Mazzu: she hadn’t changed. Nothing had changed in Stanton. Nothing ever did. Jolene was still a single lesbian mess stuck in one of the most boring towns on Earth. The summer hadn’t made anything different, and it certainly hadn’t made anything better.

The door flew open suddenly, and Jeremy rushed in, stammering out apologies. Mr. Mazzu looked exasperated, but sent him to his seat without asking for a pass. _He got lucky this time_ , Jolene thought. He wasn’t one of Mr. Mazzu’s favorites like Robbie or Simon or Gwen. Next time that happened he’d get a tardy for sure.

Jeremy settled into his desk, right next to Jolene’s. “Did I miss anything?” he asked quietly.

Jolene shook her head. “Nothing important. He introduced himself - you know him, obviously - and collected the summer work that we were all hoping he’d forget about.”

Jeremy nodded, rummaging around in his bag for the essay. “Did you do it?”

“Nah.”

Jeremy sighed. “I don’t know how you do it. You hardly ever turn anything in and yet you still make straight As.”

“I’m full of surprises, Travers.” It wasn’t as easy as Jeremy thought it was - usually Jolene’s attitude amounted to a mad scramble at the end of the quarter to get everything turned in. Harmony would always be around to help her out with it, though, and that made it at least a little less unbearable.

Jolene cast her eyes around the room. She didn’t see any other theatre kids besides Jeremy and herself. Some of them were taking different English classes, of course - they were all in different grades, and a few, like Harmony, would definitely be taking AP -

Inwardly, Jolene cursed. That had been the third time that she’d thought about Harmony in the five minutes since the school year began.

She had no idea why she was taking it so hard. They had broken up months ago, and yet it still felt like it was yesterday. She knew that nearly everyone grew apart eventually, it was only natural, but this didn’t feel natural. It felt like more than a split - it felt like a gash. Like their relationship had been severed.

 _Stop it,_ Jolene told herself. It wasn’t as big as she was making it out to be. Harmony had only been her second girlfriend ever. There would be other girls. The world wouldn’t stop spinning because of one breakup. It hadn’t last time, it wouldn’t this time.

 _But this isn’t like last time,_ a voice inside Jolene whispered. She forced herself to ignore it.

Suddenly, there was a hand waving in front of her face. She blinked, startled. “What?”

“The bell rang,” Jeremy said.

Jolene frowned. She hadn’t realized that she’d spaced out for that long. Maybe it was Mr. Mazzu’s voice droning on and on. It was going to be just as difficult to stay awake in his class as it was last year. God, she wished that he had just stuck to teaching sophomores. “Shit. Okay.”

She stood up, picking her bag up off of the floor. Jeremy had pulled his schedule out of his pocket. “What do you have next?”

“World History with Mrs. Woods,” she said. “You?”

He frowned. “Ugh. Precalc with Mr. Yates. I’ll see you at lunch, I guess?”

She nodded. “Definitely.”

She started to make her way down the aisles between the desks, trying not to be crushed in the stream of high schoolers trying to get the hell out of Mr. Mazzu’s class, before she heard her name. “Jolene. Jeremy.” She stopped, feeling Jeremy do the same beside her. At his desk, Mr. Mazzu was looking at them. “In the future, you two should try to A) be on time to my class, and B) turn your work in. Just because I know you doesn’t mean I’ll be any easier on you.” Jolene and Jeremy exchanged glances, nodding. _It’s the first day of school, Lou,_ Jolene thought to herself. _Tone it down._

“Also,” Mr. Mazzu added. There was a small smile growing on his face, and, knowing him, that could range from meaning anything to _actually good_ or _something Mr. Mazzu thought was good but is, in all actuality, a terrible idea._ “You two might want to check out the bulletin board by the auditorium. There’s something on it that might be of interest to you.”

***

In about three minutes Clark would be late to third period, but he couldn’t bring himself to care. The bulletin board had caught his attention and it either couldn’t or wouldn’t let go of it.

“I wish I could say that I was surprised,” said a voice from behind him.

Clark turned quickly, despite knowing exactly who had spoken. “You’re going to be late for third,” he said.

“So are you,” Francis said. He moved to stand next to Clark, scanning the pieces of paper stapled to the bulletin board.“Do they really think that this is going to go well?”

“Mr. Mazzu probably does. I bet Ms. Wolfe tried to talk him out of it.” Francis laughed, and Clark tried to ignore the way his heart picked up speed at the sound of it. “Ward’s going to love it.”

“It’s not like we’re going to get any funding from the school anyway,” Francis pointed out. “Might as well have some fun with it.” His eyes widened suddenly, and he reached out to pull a piece of paper out of a folder attached to the board. “Holy shit, look at this. They don’t even trust us to pick our own audition music anymore.”

“Can you blame them?” Clark said, but his mind was elsewhere. “Oh my god, we have to actually audition this year.”

“Maybe not. Maybe Simon will be the only boy to audition again.”

“Nah. Jeremy does whatever Simon does. Michael will definitely audition, maybe even Robbie. Is Thomas…”

Francis was shaking his head before Clark had even finished speaking. “No way. The only thing Tom’s interested in is playing video games in his room until two in the morning.”

“I thought that you’d maybe bribe him, or something.”

“Of course not. Why would I want him stealing my spotlight as ensemble member number three?”

Francis’s tone was sarcastic, but Clark still felt a pang at the words. He met the other boy’s eyes. “Dude. This is going to be our year.”

Francis shrugged. “If you say so.” He handed Clark a piece of audition music. “Here.” Clark skimmed through the sheet music - he knew most of it, and what he didn’t know, he could learn.

Every confident feeling in his mind seemed to evaporate when he saw the words written at the top of the paper. “Wait - auditions are on Thursday? As in, two days from now?” Francis nodded, and Clark groaned. “I’m screwed.”

“Hey,” Francis said, putting a hand on his shoulder. “No, you’re not.” They were standing much closer together now, and Clark hoped that Francis couldn’t hear the quick, hard thumping of his heart. “You’re one of the most talented people I’ve ever met. You’ll do fine.”

“If you say so,” Clark replied, mimicking Francis’s tone from earlier.

“I’m serious,” Francis insisted. “You’re amazing.” Clark wondered, not for the first time, if Francis realized that he was technically flirting with him or if he was genuinely oblivious. Or maybe the entire thing was in Clark’s head. That was definitely the most likely option.

Clark heard the sound of hissing laughter, and turned his head to see a group of guys - Robbie’s teammates, probably - walking down the hallway, looking right at them. One of them, a tall guy on the fringes of the pack, made direct eye contact with Clark, raising his eyebrows at him and smirking. Clark met his stare head-on. Across from him, Francis flipped the group off as they walked away. “That’s not even me at my gayest, assholes,” he said under his breath.

Clark didn’t understand it. He never had. Nothing ever seemed to break Francis, none of the little laughs and smirks aimed at him in the hall. Whenever anything like this happened, Clark would dwell on it for hours, replaying the interaction over and over in his head. He wasn’t sure whether he admired Francis or envied him.

Francis seemed to realize that his hand was still on Clark’s shoulder and stepped away awkwardly. “See you tonight?”

The way he said it made it seem like a question, a question that Clark would always say yes to. “Definitely.”

Francis’s smile seemed to light up his entire face. “Cool,” he said. He glanced down at his watch. “Wow, I should really go. You should too.”

“Yeah, I will. See you later.” Francis turned and Clark watched him go, his eyes lingering for a moment too long. His thoughts were going a million miles a minute, the same way they always did when he was with Francis.

It was ironic, in a way - falling for the friend with benefits who thought you were straight. If it had happened to anyone else, Clark would have laughed.

But it had happened to him, and he couldn’t even crack a smile.

***

It might have been a new year, but not much had changed at all. The school was still nearly deserted after three-thirty. The jocks still practiced out on the fields instead of in the gym. That one place at the top of the bleachers in the gym, the place where you were invisible from any window or door, still belonged to Lexi and Violet. _It’s strange,_ Lexi thought. Any athlete she knew would balk at the idea of two girls seeing ‘their’ gym as their place. And that just made it all the better.

Lexi had her phone out, switching the camera to face the two of them. Violet was laughing, trying to push the camera away, and Lexi was promising that the photo wouldn’t see the light of day, that she’d put it in a password protected album if she had to. They’d had this conversation before. It was the same song, the same dance. Not much, if anything, had changed.

But it had. They just wouldn’t talk about it.

“What -” Lexi had started to ask, but the words got caught in her throat.

A crease appeared between Violet’s brows. “What is it?” she asked.

 _What will happen after this year?_ “What classes are you taking this year?”

Violet shrugged. “Nothing special. English, Stats, Psych. Art, obviously.”

“You’re doing full day?” Most seniors at Stanton took the option to do a partial day and sleep in or head home after lunch. It shouldn’t have surprised Lexi that Violet wouldn’t.

“Of course. It looks a lot better to colleges.” It was obvious that Violet was trying to hide the tension in her voice, but Lexi didn’t call her on it. She wanted to talk about it even less than Violet did.

Violet glanced down at her phone. “I’d better go,” she said. “My parents will be wondering about me.”

Lexi nodded. “Okay,” she said. “See you tomorrow?”

“Always.” Violet leaned in to kiss her, and Lexi met her in the middle, feeling Violet’s hand come to cover her own on the bleachers between them. There was that feeling in Lexi’s stomach again, like a swarm of butterflies but somehow brighter.

The kiss was over far too quickly, and reality came rushing back to fill in the gaps. “You’ll wait?” Violet asked as she stood up. Lexi nodded. That was the system that they had come up with - whenever one of them left, the other would wait ten minutes before going too. Just in case someone was watching. Just in case they were caught.

And there was another thing they had to talk about. The secret.

Lexi didn’t know why Violet felt so strongly about keeping their relationship hidden. She wasn’t ashamed of Lexi - she’d told her that a dozen times, probably more. But she had never elaborated, and whenever Lexi tried to bring it up, Violet changed the subject. Lexi didn’t want to push her, but her own curiosity - and maybe apprehension along with it - was eating away at her. Her parents had always said that that was both her greatest strength and her greatest weakness: she always had to ask questions. She couldn’t leave anything uncovered.

Maybe that was why she laid awake at night and wondered what would happen if they were to break up. Maybe they would split without anyone knowing about their relationship, with their friends asking them why they were acting so strangely and them not being able to tell a soul. Or maybe it would be days or weeks or months later, when everyone knew that they were together and their relationship fizzled out like most high school couples statistically would.

One day there would come a day when Lexi didn’t look through the Violet album on her phone and smile at the photos and videos that she had collected. She wouldn’t delete them - she never deleted anything off of her phone, despite the device’s protesting battery life - but they would be buried beneath other albums, other photos, other videos. Other girls.

But that day wasn’t today.

Lexi blinked and Violet was gone, as if she had been nothing more than a mirage. When she looked down at the time on her phone, nearly fifteen minutes had passed. She stood, picking up her messenger bag off of the ground and slowly making her way down the stairs.

Most of the sports teams practiced in the practice fields around the back of the school, and Lexi always parked in front, making it easy to avoid them. She could hear their shouts from a long distance away, the sound of their running footsteps and clashing attitudes. It was more muted today than on a typical day - many practices had been cancelled, coaches deciding that the stress of a first day of school was more than enough. She knew that the football team was one of the ones taking off, and yet still, there was Robbie Thorne, sprinting up and down the football field as if he was being chased.

Lexi paused on the sidewalk, turning in the direction of the field. He couldn’t see her, and she could hardly see him, his facial features blurred out by the distance between them. She hardly recognized him as it was. He moved desperately, fiercely, in a way that, despite not being close to Robbie, she could tell was out of character. It was as if there was something on his shoulders, weighing down on him. He was hiding something, keeping something packed so tightly inside that this was the only way he could fight it.

Lexi gripped the strap of her bag tighter. _And so it begins,_ she thought. Yet another year full of secrets for Stanton Drama. It might have been a new year, but not much had changed at all.

***

Thursday came quickly - too quickly. Jolene had barely gotten a chance to look over the audition music before she had to perform it in front of the whole troupe.

Well - not the whole troupe. Lilette was gone, and despite not being particularly close with her, Jolene felt her absence like the loss of a limb. She couldn’t imagine what it felt to be Simon or Robbie. She was surprised that the two of them had even showed up to audition - after everything with Simon’s parents trying to pull him out of the show last year, she was surprised that he had been allowed to, and after everything that had been thrown at Robbie in the past few months, she was surprised that he had wanted to. Both of them were sitting apart from the others, just a few rows back, a few seats over. It was nearly impossible to notice that anything had changed.

But everything had changed. That much was evident from Harmony sitting at the other end of the row from her.

Jolene blinked, tuning out her own thoughts and looking up at the stage. The boy currently auditioning was a freshman, someone who Jolene didn’t know - she thought that that she’d heard someone say that his name was Skylar. His voice was nice, sure, but he was quiet, reserved, shying away from the spotlight. He kind of reminded her of Lilette, back when she had first auditioned, back when Jolene thought that she was nothing. When Jolene thought that she herself might have a shot. Now, she would be lucky to be in the ensemble.

Skylar wasn’t the only freshman auditioning - there were two others, Clark’s younger sisters. She could only tell them apart by the colors of their shirts and the sound of their voices. The one in the orange with the smooth, confident voice and the loud laugh was Kendra. The one in the pink who spoke quietly and tripped over certain sounds was Hannah. She hadn’t heard them audition yet, but if they were anything like their brother, they were bound to be good.

Clark himself was sitting in front of her, Francis next to him just like always. She reached out, tapping him on the shoulder. “I expected a lot more new faces this year,” she said.

Clark nodded. “Me too,” he replied. “I mean, other than my sisters, there’s like two new people. I’m not even sure if it’s enough to put on the show.”

“We definitely didn’t have enough last year,” Francis pointed out. “Remember when I had to play both Georg and Herr Knochenbruch during Totally Fucked?”

“Dude, we were the best adult men,” Clark said.

“We were.” Francis glanced behind Jolene. “Hey, do either of you know her? I don’t think she’s a freshman.”

Jolene looked over her shoulder and felt her heart stop.

“I think I recognize her,” she heard Clark say over the rush of blood in her ears. “She’s the teacher’s aide for my English teacher. Her name’s Piper.”

 _Piper Nicole Perez._ Just the mention of her name brought back every memory that Jolene had tried desperately to bury over the past year rushing back. She clenched her fist, sharp nails digging into skin. _Breathe. Breathe._ “Hey, are you okay?”

Jolene blinked, over at Francis’s concerned expression. “Yeah, I’m fine,” she said. “I just -”

She was interrupted by Ms. Wolfe calling Francis’s name. He raised his eyebrows, standing up and beginning to make his way to the stage. Clark reached out, grabbing his hand and further convincing Jolene that he was about as straight as she was. “You’ll do great.”

Francis smiled. “Thanks,” he said. He glanced over at Jolene. “You’re sure you’re alright? You looked really freaked out for a second.”

She nodded. “I’m fine. Go. Break a leg.” She looked over her shoulder again. She couldn’t help it - it was like she and Piper were magnets with opposite poles. This time, Piper was looking straight at her. She raised one eyebrow, waving. Jolene felt a shiver go down her spine and she turned away quickly, locking eyes with Harmony. There was a question in the other girl’s eyes, alarm mixed with curiosity. Jolene shook her head, looking back towards the stage.

She didn’t know what she had expected. It wasn’t as if she’d never see Piper again. They still went to the same school, there was still a possibility that they’d share classes, that they’d bump into each other in the hallway. But somehow, they hadn’t. It was as if the universe was keeping them apart, and Jolene was honestly glad for it. Eventually she’d even managed to get Piper out of her head almost entirely - not forgetting her, of course, but not having the memory of her constantly present in the back of her skull.

But there she was again. Jolene could feel her eyes affixed to the back of her head, seeming to track her every movement, her every thought. Every bone in her body itched to turn around and look at her again, seeking the proof that she was actually there and not just a vivid hallucination that her mind had conjured up. She almost wished that she was. Everything would be so much easier if Piper were nothing but a ghost, a phantom. If she could just disappear, or have never been real at all.

And yet there she was in flesh and blood, sitting just a few seats behind Jolene.

Jolene blinked as the sounds of applause filled the auditorium, jolting her out of her daze. Francis was exiting the stage. She couldn’t tell from his face or from Ms. Wolfe or Mr. Mazzu’s if he’d done well. Knowing him, he probably had, and he would be an understudy again anyway. Such is life.

“Piper Perez?” Jolene felt a shiver go down her spine at the sound of her name. She refused to look as Piper passed down the aisle next to her, even when she knew that Piper was looking at her. Halfway to the stage, she passed by Francis, who was returning to his seat. She caught his arm as he passed by, saying something too quiet for Jolene to hear, but she could tell from the way the color drained from Francis’s face that it was nothing good. _So much for her having changed,_ Jolene thought.

“Are you okay?” she asked Francis when he sat down. “What did she just say to you?”

“It’s nothing,” Francis said. “I’m fine.” He wasn’t fine - it was so obvious that she wondered why he even bothered trying to hide it. But it would be hypocritical to call him out on it, so she stayed silent.

Clark squeezed Francis’s shoulder. “You know she’s just trying to psych you out,” he said.

“Maybe,” Francis said. He didn’t look convinced.

Jolene turned her attention to the stage. Piper had begun to sing, and of course Jolene couldn’t take her eyes off of her. She was unfairly good, and unfairly beautiful, and Jolene hated everything about it.

Just months ago, Jolene’s life had been fine. She had her girlfriend, she had the troupe, she had managed to put all of her problems behind her. And then, one by one, everything had started to fall apart. It was as if the floor was falling out from underneath her, and there was nothing that she could do to stop it. All she could do was hold on.

***

“No. Absolutely not.”

“Why not?”

“Because you can’t keep doing this, Lou. It’s always your three favorites.”

“Because they’re _good_ , Tracey.”

“Do you think that I don’t know that? That’s the problem. They’re _all_ good, and you’re just choosing to cast your favorites as the leads again. I thought that you were trying to shake things up.”

“I - fine. What do you suggest?”

“Well, first of all, these two should be obvious.”

“I can see it. You’re right.”

“I’m sorry?”

“What?”

“Can you repeat that? I’ve never heard you say it before, I didn’t think that you knew what it meant.”

“...anyway. I’ve got an idea.”

“And there’s the Lou Mazzuchelli that I know.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“She’s never been in a show before, and you want to cast her as a lead.”

“Tracey, you and I both know that she was outstanding at that audition. She’d be perfect - or the closest we can get to it since we don’t have Lilette.”

“Fine. That’s your one allowance.”

“Excuse me?”

“Your one out-of-the-box casting allowed for this show. Your single shakeup. Now, what about…”

“Now who’s shaking things up?”

“What?”

“He’s never been cast as a lead before.”

“Neither had any of your leads last year, and that worked out just fine. And if we cast him opposite him, their chemistry would be off the charts.”

“That’s true. Aren’t they dating?”

“No?”

“They aren’t?”

“As far as I know, they’ve never been a couple.”

“Hm. Could have fooled me. Anyway, as for these two, what about…”

“Those two actually were a couple.”

“They are?”

“ _Were_. I’m pretty sure that things are still sore between them.”

“That makes them all the better for these roles.”

“If you say so. And then Robbie -”

“Yes. Perfect. We’ve got a cast, Tracey.”

“...Lou, do you think that we might be playing with fire just a bit here?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean that we’re just leaning more into the controversy of last year. Don’t you think that it might backfire?”

“Come _on_ , Tracey. We’ve got control now. What’s the harm in doing something with it?”

“Promise me.”

“What?”

“Promise me that if something goes wrong, you’ll own up to it.”

“Wh - okay. Fine. I promise you.”

“Fine. Here we go. Stanton Drama presents _Rent_. I can’t decide whether it’s going to be beautiful or disastrous.”

“Who says that it can’t be both?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> recommended listening: plum - troye sivan | secrets - onerepublic | come under the covers - WALK THE MOON  
> talk to me on twitter @annileej and tumblr @glorioussimon!!


	2. can't tell that you're bigger

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> jeremy gets some unexpected news, francis experiences a crisis of confidence, harmony struggles to balance her thoughts, violet pushes her feelings aside, and simon makes a risky decision.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tw for brief suicide mention from "And then there they were." to "He wouldn't let it be."

**anabelle!!** ( _7:55am): GET OVER HERE THE CAST LIST IS UP!_

 **You** ( _7:56am): am i finally living my dream of playing the squeegee man_

 **anabelle!!** _(7:56am): JEREMY!!!_

 **You** _(7:56am): OKAY IM COMING_

Simon caught up to Jeremy on his way into the building, standing just close enough to him for their hands to brush together as they walked and have it still look like an accident. “Have you heard?” he asked.

“About the cast list?” Jeremy replied. “I heard about it, yeah - Anabelle sent me a _very_ strongly worded text - but I don’t know who’s on it.”

“Same,” Simon said. “I mean, not about Anabelle -” As far as Jeremy knew, Simon and Anabelle hadn’t spoken to each other, hardly even looked at each other, since their breakup last year. It was probably for the best, he thought. “- but I do know that it’s up.” There was something hovering underneath the casual tone of his voice. A year ago, Jeremy wouldn’t have even noticed it. But a lot could change in twelve months.

“You’ll definitely get cast,” Jeremy said. “You know that. You’re crazy talented.”

Simon shook his head. “That’s not what I’m worried about.”

“Then what -”

He was cut off by Anabelle rushing over to them as soon as they turned the corner. “What took you so long?” she asked Jeremy.

“I wasn’t aware that I was taking a longer time than usual,” Jeremy replied. He raised his eyebrows. “What’s going on with the cast list? You weren’t this excited about Spring Awakening or anything else, did you get a lead or something?”

“No, of course _I_ didn’t,” Anabelle said dismissively. Jeremy opened his mouth, but she cut him off, grabbing his hand. “Just...come _on_!”

He let Anabelle pull him towards the bulletin board, hyperaware of Simon following a few steps behind them, just far enough away to seem like he wasn’t part of their group. Jeremy stopped dead in front of the bulletin board, reading over the cast list probably five times before the words finally set in. “Oh my god.”

_Please initial beside your name if you accept your part and remember to pick up your scripts from Ms. Wolfe or Mr. Mazzu. Rehearsals start on Monday at 3pm._

  * Mark Cohen - Simon Saunders
  * Roger Davis - Jeremy Travers
  * Mimi Marquez - Piper Perez
  * Tom Collins - Clark Howard
  * Angel Dumott Schunard - Francis Russo
  * Maureen Johnson - Jolene Brooks
  * Joanne Jefferson - Harmony Curtis
  * Benny Coffin III - Robbie Thorne
  * Mrs. Cohen/Ensemble - Gwen Strickland
  * Alexi Darling/Ensemble - Kaitlin Mazzuchelli
  * Mrs. Jefferson/Ensemble - Hannah Howard
  * Paul/Mr. Jefferson/Ensemble - Michael Hallowell
  * Pam/Mrs. Davis/Ensemble - Anabelle Bowman
  * Steve/Mrs. Marquez/Ensemble - Violet Bell
  * Gordon/The Man/Ensemble - Skylar Powers
  * Ali/Waiter/Ensemble - Lexi Jones
  * Sue/Ensemble - Sasha Foley
  * Homeless Woman/Ensemble - Kendra Howard



It looked as if almost everyone else had already seen the cast list, there were initials beside every name except Francis’s, Robbie’s, and Simon’s and his own. He glanced over at Simon, whose eyes had seemed to almost glaze over at the sight of the cast list. There was something indescribable in his description, not fear, but something deeper-set. Jeremy wanted to ask him if he was okay, but he knew that he couldn’t say anything in front of Anabelle.

(They both knew that Anabelle had most likely figured it out by now. It was just easier to pretend like she was clueless.)

He became aware that Anabelle was squeezing his hand. “Jeremy?”

“Yeah, I’m alive,” he said. “Just...oh my god, I’m Roger.”

Anabelle nodded. “You’re Roger.” She was smiling so widely that it was as if she had been the one cast as a lead. It made it impossible not to smile too.

“Sorry to interrupt, but do either of you have a pen or something?”

It took Anabelle a moment to respond. “Yeah, um…” She dug through one of the side compartments of her bag quickly, digging out a blue pen. She handed it to Simon. “Here.”

“Thanks.” Simon stretched his arm out, initialing beside his name. He met Jeremy’s eyes, that emotion lingering in them before not having faded one bit. “Do you need…?”

Jeremy nodded. “Yeah. Thanks.” Their hands brushed together as Simon handed him the pen, and he could feel both his and Anabelle’s eyes on him as he signed his initials. _Jeremy Travers._

***

The door swung open before Francis even had a chance to knock. “Francis,” said Ms. Wolfe. “Here to pick up your script?”

“Why did you cast me as Angel?” he asked.

Inwardly, he cursed - he hadn’t meant to say it so bluntly. Ms. Wolfe still intimidated the hell out of him, even if he would die before he admitted it, and the way she was looking at him now just terrified him even more. He crossed his arms over his chest, feeling suddenly vulnerable.

“Do you not want the role?” Ms. Wolfe asked him.

“I - of _course_ I do.” He hadn’t been able to stop thinking about the show since the first day of school. He’d been humming the songs under his breath and writing the lyrics to _I’ll Cover You_ and _Today 4 U_ in the margins of his papers (his teachers probably hated him). “I just...I’m not...I’m not good enough.”

Ms. Wolfe was silent for a long time, so long that Francis wondered if she hadn’t heard him. Finally, she spoke. “You’re joking, right?”

Francis frowned. “What?”

“You’re incredible,” she said. “You’ve got talent, and you know it. You’re a singer, a dancer -”

“I haven’t danced in years,” he interrupted her. “Not really, anyway.”

“That doesn’t change the fact that you’re good at it.” She shook her head at him. “Francis, this is really unlike you. You’re usually one of the most confident kids I know. What changed?”

“Nothing’s changed,” he said. He was telling the truth - nothing had changed, not really. Clark had asked him a similar question last night. Francis had the bad habit of shutting down whenever there was something messing with his head, and Clark had noticed because of _course_ he had. “ _Does it have anything to do with what Piper said to you at auditions?_ ” he’d asked. Francis had shook his head and leaned over to kiss him, and then they hadn’t spoken much at all for the rest of the night.

He pushed the thoughts out of his mind. He couldn’t think about Clark, not now.

“That’s the only reason, then?” he asked. “Nothing...else?”

Ms. Wolfe shook her head. She still looked puzzled, and Francis supposed that that was a good thing. “What other reason would I have?” she said. “You’re the best choice for the role. And if I was going to play favorites, it certainly wouldn’t be with _you_ of all people.” Francis laughed at that, just a little, and Ms. Wolfe smiled. She picked up a script off of her desk and shoved it into his hands. “That’s yours,” she said. “Rehearsals start on Monday at three o’clock sharp - don’t be late. And learn to walk in heels. We don’t want any broken ankles, this isn’t Rent Live.”

Francis nodded. “I’ll do my best,” he promised. He turned to leave, but heard Ms. Wolfe call his name again. He looked over his shoulder. “Yeah? I mean, yes?”

“Whatever has you so nervous about this, you can talk to me about it anytime,” she said. “I need you to know that. Tell me that you understand me.”

“I understand,” said Francis. “Thank you. I’ll keep that in mind.” She didn’t seem convinced, but he left anyway, shutting the door behind him. He had his head down as he flipped through the script. He had no idea that he wasn’t alone until he nearly walked right into Robbie Thorne. He stumbled backwards. “Shit, sorry.”

“It’s fine,” said Robbie. He looked the same way he had every time Francis had seen him since the school year - distant. Different than the boy Francis used to know. “Hey, congratulations. On your role in Rent, I mean.”

Francis fought to keep a neutral expression, but something must have given him away. Robbie smiled wryly. “I guess I wasn’t the only one who wasn’t happy with my role.”

“It’s not that I wasn’t _happy_ with it,” said Francis. “I just...wait. Why weren’t you happy with yours?”

Robbie sighed, his shoulders slumping. “Because I’m not a good actor. You know that.”

“Wait, what? Yes, you are. You made the freaking superintendent cry during Those You’ve Known last year.”

“That wasn’t acting. I thought that you of all people would get that.” Suddenly, Robbie seemed to flinch. “I’m sorry, I know you don’t like to bring that up -”

“It’s fine,” Francis said. “Really. Everyone knows about it anyway.” It was just a fact. Francis Russo. Sixteen years old. Bisexual. Filipino-American. Theatre kid. Dead dad. That was what people thought about when they looked at him. He’d had three years to get used to it, and he’d have years more.

Robbie had gone quiet, but he was still staring at him. “You don’t have to answer this if you don’t want to,” he said finally, “but how the hell do you live with it?”

Now it was Francis’s turn to fall silent.

He would go straight home after school that day. He would make sure that Thomas was doing good, hope that the transition from middle to high school wasn’t being too rough on him. Thomas would never tell him much, but it would be enough. He would make him do his homework and then do the same to himself, looking up the answers on Google when he had no clue what he was doing. He’d try to make dinner, burn himself, and make a sandwich instead. He would go to bed before his mother got home and get up after she left, the same way that he had since she started working longer hours to provide for two teenage boys as a single mom. Everything felt half-formed, like they were a puzzle missing a piece, like a painting missing a color. Every since that day when he was fourteen, he hadn’t been the same person, and he knew without knowing that he’d never be that boy again.

“Honestly?” he heard himself say through the haze of thoughts filling his mind. “I don’t know. I...I don’t think that I really do.” He blinked, meeting Robbie’s eyes. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I wish that I  could be more helpful, but-”

“No,” Robbie said. “Thank you. Really.” He slipped past Francis, patting him on the back in that way that straight bros did as he walked over towards Ms. Wolfe’s office. Francis turned, watching him go for a moment, then stepped out into the hallway.

He was completely alone now, everyone else having already made it to their first period classes. He was definitely going to be late, but he couldn’t bring himself to care, leaning against one of the rows of lockers.

He stared down at his script, running his hand over the words on the cover. He was playing a lead this year - he had never thought it would happen, but here he was. Maybe Clark was right when he had said that it was going to be their year.

And then there they were. Piper’s words from auditions, echoing in his head again.

“ _I don’t know why you try so hard. They’ll cast you no matter what you do. How heartless would they have to be to reject a kid whose dad killed himself?”_

It wasn’t true.

He wouldn’t let it be.

***

It was just about ten in the morning, and Harmony’s third period physics class was just as questionably alive as ever. Heads resting on hands, elbows on desks, eyelids drooping. Phones had been hastily stashed in pockets and under desks when the teacher came close, and arms covered the work that hadn’t been done on the warm-up questions they had collected when they came in at the beginning of class. Looking around, she was the only one she could see who had bothered to even attempt them.

The teacher was pacing at the front of the room, trying to get someone, anyone, to answer the damn question. With a sigh, Harmony raised her hand, and, with a grin, the teacher called her name. “The frequency is equal to the wavelength divided by the velocity of the wave.”

Before she even finished the sentence, the teacher was shaking her head. She heard other students responding in murmuring tones, not wanting to be loud enough to risk the teacher calling on them instead - _No, she switched them up; It’s velocity over wavelength; She divided it wrong._ The teacher hadn’t called Harmony out on it, not explicitly, anyway, she had just started working out the problem the correct way on the board. And yet still Harmony felt as if she’d been punched in the stomach.

This was how it always happened. She participated in class. She did _well_ in class. She made teachers like her, made other students expect things of her, had a reputation at Stanton High School as being one of the smart ones, a serious contender for valedictorian. It wasn’t just what other people expected from her - it was what she expected from herself. It was what her sister was doing, and it was what she would do.

Her gaze flickered down to her backpack. It was still open from when she had grabbed her binder a few minutes ago, and she could see the Rent script peeking out of it. In the front of the room, the teacher was still talking, and Harmony knew in the back of her mind that she should be paying attention. But she let herself be drawn into the hurricane that was her thoughts anyway.

When she was a freshman, she’d asked her dad about auditioning for the musical - she hadn’t done any theatre in middle school, but the cute girl in her biology class had been talking about it, and when Harmony had asked her about it, she’d encouraged her to try out. Harmony’s father had been fine with it, as long as she was only playing a minor part and it didn’t interfere with her schoolwork. It had all worked out okay that year - she was in the chorus and her grades didn’t slip one bit. And she’d gotten closer and closer with that cute girl in her biology class, until they’d shared a kiss at the cast party and decided that they’d be better together than apart. Spring Awakening had been fine too, at first. Thea, despite being a great character, was a minor one. It was more time doing what she loved, it was more time being with Jolene. Harmony was happy, and so was her father.

Then she and Jolene had broken up for good, and everything fell apart. She’d hardly managed to keep a 4.0 that year, and she’d known that her dad had noticed. He hadn’t said anything directly about it, but with all the other controversy surrounding Spring Awakening, it would be the obvious train of thought.

And now here she was, breaking one of the rules that they had set - _as long as she was playing a minor part._ She wasn’t going to turn down the part. She’d thought about it, but couldn’t bring herself to do it. Even though the ex who she wasn’t on great terms with was playing her love interest. Even if Harmony thought that she might still be in love with her.

She shook her head. That was a tangent that she couldn’t afford to go off on.

She had two choices. Tell her dad about Rent, knowing that he wouldn’t be pleased with it. Or somehow avoid him finding out.

Suddenly, the students surrounding her started to move, standing up and moving to the lab benches. Harmony blinked, squinting at the board. They had been sorted into groups, likely for some sort of lab preparation.

 _The show hasn’t already started yet and it’s already screwing you up,_ a voice from somewhere inside of her whispered. _What’s going to happen in a day, a week, a month?_

She forced herself to ignore it.

***

“Oh my god, Scarlett Johansson,” said Francis. “It’s an honor to finally meet you.”

“Shut up,” said Violet, not looking up from the table. She heard Francis approaching her, and then he finally appeared in her field of vision, setting his bag down and sitting down on the paint-stained stool opposite her. “I don’t know what they were thinking,” she said. “I mean, one of my characters is a guy, and the other speaks only Spanish. I don’t speak a word of Spanish, I took French. You took French too, right?”

“Oui,” said Francis. “Do you know anyone who might?”

“I think Jolene mentioned that Piper did once.” Violet looked up just in time to see Francis flinch just slightly enough that she wouldn’t have noticed it if she didn’t know him. She’d seen that split-second interaction between him and Piper at the auditions, but she had no idea what had actually been said. She wanted to ask Francis about it, but she knew that there was no point. He’d just say that it was nothing, that he was fine, and he would repeat it until he believed it himself.

“What are you working on?” he asked her, changing the subject.

She slid the two completed cards across the table to him. “We’re supposed to be making playing cards. A full suit - king, queen, ace, jack. The two that you’re holding are the ace and the jack.”

Francis squinted at the cards. “Are these -”

“Yeah. That’s Jolene and Clark.”

“What do the flowers mean?”

“Jolene’s are stargazer lilies, meaning ambition. Clark’s are delphinium, meaning joy.”

“Suits him. No pun intended.”

Francis’s gaze lingered on Clark’s card for just a second longer than usual. It was impossible for Violet not to notice. “I’d have given _you_ the obliviousness flower if I could find one, of course,” she said.

Francis looked up sharply. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“You know exactly what I mean.”

Francis sighed. “I’ve told you a million times. Clark and I are just -”

“I swear to god, if you say ‘bros having a good time’, I’ll throw paint at you.”

“But it’s the _truth_.” Violet flicked her paintbrush, and blue watercolors splashed on the side of Francis’s face. He choked, turning away. “I hate you.”

“I know.” Violet looked back down at the painting in front of her, continuing to speak to Francis as she kept working on it. “Seriously, though. Bros don’t look at each other the way Clark looks at you.”

“He’s straight, though,” said Francis. “He’s into Anabelle. He told me.”

 _Poor Anabelle,_ Violet thought. She always seemed to end up being the default beard in the troupe. She shrugged. “If that’s what you think.”

Francis opened his mouth to say something else, but got distracted by the sight of the painting Violet was working on. “Is that me?” he asked.

Violet nodded. “Yeah, it’s you. It’s a good thing you’re here, actually. I can use you as a model.”

“Should I, like, pose or anything?” Francis asked. “Draw me like one of your French girls?”

“Please don’t do that. Just sit there and look pretty. You’re good at it.”

“Thanks. Make me look hotter?”

“I’ll do my best.”

For a while, they worked in a comfortable silence. Violet painted and mixed colors and swore when the colors didn’t mix just so. Francis took out his Rent script and was already studying it, clearly thrilled that he had actual substantial lines this year. In the hallway next to them, the other students were on their way out, laughing and cheering and dashing towards the doors, rejoicing that they had survived the first week of the school year. Finally the footsteps turned to just echoes and then turned to nothing at all, and it was just the two of them in the fine arts wing.

“Who’s the fourth card?” Francis asked suddenly.

Violet frowned. “What?”

“The fourth card,” Francis repeated. “I’m assuming that I’m the king. Jolene’s the ace, Clark is the jack. Who’s the queen? You?”

Violet almost laughed, shaking her head. “No. It’s definitely not me.”

“Why not? It’s your project. You should have a card.”

Violet shrugged. “I honestly didn’t think of it that way,” she said. As often as she drew portraits of her friends, she never drew self-portraits. Whenever she tried, she couldn’t capture herself the way she saw herself, that indescribable way that she thought of herself. That nothing and everything all at once. “I haven’t decided who the queen is yet, actually,” she said carefully. “I’ll figure it out when I finish yours.”

Francis stared at her for a moment. It was unlike her, and they both knew it. When it came to art, she was always prepared, even if she drifted off of that plan as time went on. Just when she thought he was going to say something, his phone buzzed, and he glanced down at it. She heard him sigh. “I should go,” he said. “Thomas is sending me angry texts for not being at the car yet.”

“Bye. Thanks for modeling.”

“You’re welcome. Thanks for a great portrait.”

“It’s not even finished yet.”

“Yeah, but I know you. It’ll be great.”

She waited until the sound of his footsteps had faded before she set her paintbrush down, setting the card next to the other two. On the far left was Jolene’s, the lilies arranged on her head like a crown, her smile proud and her arms crossed. Next to her was Clark, the flowers forming a border around him. His eyes were looking just slightly to the right, to where she had placed Francis’s card. He hadn’t asked about his flower - chrysanthemums, for loyalty. She couldn’t think of anything better for the boy who had been her best friend since middle school.

She stood up, walking over to the drying rack. She had finished the queen card just before Francis had come in, which she was grateful for - she didn’t know how she would deflect his questions if he had seen it. Lexi, surrounded by a bed of gardenias. Gardenias for secret love.

Violet hadn’t been lying when she said that she hadn’t thought of making a card for herself. But she had thought of what flower would symbolise her. A hydrangea, meaning both understanding and heartlessness.

***

“Okay!” Mr. Mazzu yelled, clapping his hands. “Guys, up here!”

Gradually, the troupe began to fall silent, focusing on Mr. Mazzu where he stood on the stage. He was holding the script in one hand and a stack of papers in the other. “I cannot tell you guys how excited I am to be here,” he said. “And how excited I am that you’re all here. This is going to be a damn good show. But first…” He held up the stack of papers. “I’m sure you all remember the...there’s no easy way to say this, the disasters with Spring Awakening last year. And for those of you that don’t, I’m sure that everyone will make sure to tell you all about it. To try to prevent anything like that from happening again, I’ve got some permission slips here.” He handed the stack of permission slips to a boy sitting on the edge of the stage. “Coach Strickland and I have managed to coordinate a schedule so the more athletic of us can still participate in both football and the show. So I’ve got my son Gordy here as our stage manager this year - Gordy, wave -” Gordy, seemingly very reluctantly, waved. “ - and he’ll be passing out the permission slips to you. Make sure that your parents - or guardians,” he added, looking at Jeremy, “see these and sign them. You’ll need their consent to participate in this show.”

Simon could have sworn that Mr. Mazzu was looking at him through his entire spiel. He took the paper from Gordy, holding it a bit too hard and feeling it crumple slightly in his hands. Just looking at it made his heart beat faster.

This was it. This was what he was afraid of - everything that had happened last year repeating itself.

Jeremy was sitting towards the front of the stage, and he turned his head just slightly, glancing over at Simon, who was sitting alone in the back. He didn’t say or mouth anything, barely even moved, but Simon still knew exactly what he was asking. He nodded. I’ll be okay. Don’t worry about it.

He didn’t know how convincing he was, but Jeremy turned away, looking back at Mr. Mazzu. “We’re just going to start with our act one read-through today,” he was saying. “We’ll be going backwards, starting with La Vie Boheme, if that’s okay with you guys.” The troupe cheered, and Mr. Mazzu smiled. “I thought it might be.”

***

The damn song wouldn’t get out of Simon’s head.

_“Anyone out of the mainstream…”_

He was standing in front of his desk, the permission slip flattened out in front of him.

_“Is anyone in the mainstream?”_

Downstairs, he could hear his parents and Emma sitting down at the dinner table. Any time now, they’d call him down, and he’d have to go.

_“Anyone alive with a sex drive…”_

He could bring the permission slip with him, and explain the show to them. Or he could leave it here and forget about it. Or he could take another option.

_“Tear down the wall, aren’t we all?”_

All he wanted was to be normal, to have a normal family. But he wasn’t. And he didn’t know how to accept that.

All he knew was that his father definitely wouldn’t.

_“The opposite of war isn’t peace - it’s creation!”_

Simon picked up a pen off of his desk and signed Robert Saunders with a flourish.

_“Viva la vie boheme!”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> recommended listening: carry the weight - morgxn | burn out - imagine dragons | grip - seeb, bastille  
> come talk to me on twitter @annileej and tumblr @glorioussimon!!


	3. holding back the flood

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> jeremy thinks about the past, simon's past and present collide, jolene's past begins to repeat itself, and violet and clark look to the future.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i wanted this to be up sooner but then i was sick so it's been slow going :( i'm on spring break now though so hopefully i'll be able to write another chapter this week!

**Gordy** _(7:32am): my dad says to remind you guys to get your permission slips signed_

 **Gordy** _(7:32am): if you don’t do it he might kill you (he didn’t say it but its kind of obvious) so you should get it done_

Jeremy handed the permission slip to Zach as he passed by where he was sitting at the counter. Zach, intently focused on his phone, didn’t even glance at the paper as he signed it. “You didn’t even look at that,” Jeremy pointed out. “Maybe you just signed my soul away.”

Zach looked up. “Did I?”

“Not exactly.”

“Great.” Zach drew the paper closer to him, skimming the brief introduction at the top of it. “You didn’t have to get one of these signed last year, did you?”

Jeremy shook his head, placing a bowl of cereal on the counter and sitting down next to Zach. “No,” he said between bites. “I think it’s a new thing, since, you know…”

“What happened with Simon last year,” Zach finished. Jeremy nodded. He didn’t say anything, but somehow, Zach picked up on his exact thoughts. “I’m sure he’s doing fine. You said that his mom knows about you guys right? And she’s fine with it?”

“I think so,” Jeremy said. “But Simon doesn’t really believe it.” He took another bite of his cereal. “I don’t know what he’s going to do. I tried to ask him, but he just brushed me off. I don’t think he’d forge a signature…” _Would he?_ Even with all of Simon’s anxieties about the show, Jeremy knew that he would still do anything to be a part of it. He hoped that that meant working up the courage to ask his mom to sign the permission slip and not lying to Mr. Mazzu and Ms. Wolfe’s faces.

Jeremy forced the thought out of his head, mindlessly scrolling through Instagram. He wasn’t actually taking in any of the information on the screen - there was Cheryl settling in in New York, there was Michael’s aesthetic shot of the Starbucks he had picked up after rehearsal last night, there was the rare post from the account of a long-cancelled tv show trying to encourage him to buy the episodes off of iTunes. Eventually, he stumbled across a post that he hadn’t seen before. “Did you see Xander’s new post?” he asked Zach.

“On what, Facebook?” Zach asked.

“Instagram. I don’t think he uses Facebook. I don’t think that _anyone_ below the age of twenty uses Facebook anymore.”

Zach pointed at him. “Okay, first of all, you’re not supposed to make me feel old at the age of twenty-two. That’s not allowed.” He scooted closer to Jeremy. “Show me the post.”

Jeremy slid the phone across the counter to Zach, and, as soon as Zach saw it, he burst out laughing. “Oh man, Jeremy.”

“I was so excited to be the gay cousin,” Jeremy said. “How can there be two gay cousins? I didn’t think that it worked like that.”

“I hate to break it to you, Jeremy, but I don’t think that ‘there can only be one gay cousin in a family’ is an actual biological rule.” Zach handed the phone back to Jeremy. “Message him a Spider-Man meme.”

“The learning to be Spider-Man one or the pointing Spider-Men one?”

“Yes.”

Jeremy began scrolling through his photo album, knowing that he had at least one of the two saved. “Have you heard anything about the rest of the family on that archaic website you call Facebook?”

Zach shrugged. “Same old, same old. Jake’s been arrested again, Ethan’s up for a Nobel Prize.”

“Very funny.” Jeremy only saw his aunt, uncle, and cousins once or twice a year, and every time he saw them, he had to suppress his envy. They seemed so...normal. And that normalcy, that familiarity, was something that Jeremy had always craved. He pushed his cereal around in the bowl. “Do you think they know about…”

“About you? And our parents?” Zach finished. Jeremy nodded, and Zach shrugged. “I don’t know. I don’t know if they would have told anyone about it.”

“If they did, they’d spin it around to favor them,” Jeremy said. He wasn’t meeting Zach’s eyes. “Of course they would. They’ve never told the truth.” Maybe Aunt Julia and Uncle James hated him now. It wouldn’t surprise him.

Zach shook his head. “Don’t say that,” he said. “It’s more likely that they’ve just brushed it under the rug.”

“Forgotten that I ever existed?” Jeremy said.

He looked up just in time to catch the pained expression that flickered across Zach’s face. He wasn’t sure whether he wanted him to say anything about it, and wasn’t sure whether the feeling he felt was relief or anger when Zach changed the subject. “Hurry up and finish your cereal,” he said, standing up and walking over to the stand by the door where he kept his keys. “I’ll drop you off on my way to work.” Zach had managed to find a job as a manager at a sporting goods store while he took classes online to get his masters in psychology. Jeremy still felt guilty that he’d ripped him away from college, but every time that he brought it up, Zach brushed it off.

Jeremy sighed, placing his bowl in the dishwasher. Zach’s corgi, whom he was still stubbornly referring to as Microwave, was weaving around his feet, looking for a snack, and he shook his head. “Sorry, Mikey,” he said. “I’ve got nothing.”

***

Simon tried to play off how startled he was at the sound of the knock on the door, but Lilette picked up on it instantly. She always did. “I thought you said you were alone?” she asked through laughter.

“I thought I was,” he said defensively. His dad had been on a business trip for the past two days, his mother travelling with him, and Emma was at a friend’s house. Simon was glad for the quiet - not just in the empty house, but in his head. He placed his laptop on the coffee table, making sure not to accidentally close the Skype window. “I’ll go check. It’s probably just someone selling something.”

“I’m not going anywhere,” he heard Lilette say as he stood up. He was glad that he was turned away from her, that way, she couldn’t see him frown. He missed her more than he could say, in a way that sometimes seemed to physically hurt. Losing Lilette was like losing a limb. Everything had changed since she’d left - he sat alone at rehearsals now, and even when he was included, he always felt like he was somehow on the outside. At this point, it felt like there was only one good thing in his life.

And that good thing was standing outside of his front door.

Simon pulled open the door, staring at Jeremy. “What -” he started to say. But then it dawned on him, and he groaned.

“You forgot, didn’t you?” Jeremy asked, grinning.

“No, I…” Simon sighed. “Yes. I forgot, I’m so sorry. I was Skyping with Lilette and…”

“Oh,” Jeremy said. “I can go then, we can reschedule or something.”

Simon almost agreed with him. He almost said yes, almost told him a time when he could come back later. But then he glanced over his shoulder at the laptop turned away from them in the living room, and then back at the boy in front of him, and something seemed to click in his head. “No,” he said. “Stay.”

Jeremy’s brows knitted together. “Are you sure?” he asked.

“It’ll be fine,” Simon said. “We can tell her that we’re running lines or something, not…” _Not going on ‘dates’ at each other’s houses because I can’t actually go out._

Jeremy nodded, but he still looked concerned. “I don’t want it to be like you having to choose between us or anything,” he said.

Simon shook his head. “It’s not like that,” he said. He reached down, squeezing Jeremy’s hand briefly. “Trust me. It’s okay. I’m okay.”

A slight smile flashed across Jeremy’s face. “Okay,” he echoed. He let Simon lead him to the living room, dropping his hand as soon as they crossed the threshold. Simon could see something change in Lilette’s face when she saw them together, but couldn’t tell what it was. He ignored the startlingly quick pace of his heart. _You’re just two friends running lines,_ he told himself. The lie made his stomach twist, but the truth made his throat close off, so he went for the former.

“I completely forgot,” he said as he sat down. “I invited Jeremy over to run lines today.”

Lilette nodded. “You’re playing Roger, right?” she asked Jeremy.

“Yeah,” said Jeremy. “Surprisingly. I think we all expected Mr. Mazzu and Ms. Wolfe to just stick with his favorites from last year. Robbie, Simon, Gwen, Michael….” He trailed off, but Simon still knew exactly what he had wanted to say. _You._

Either Lilette didn’t notice or she chose to ignore it. “Who else is in it?” she asked. “Simon sent me the cast list, but I was kind of distracted by his and Robbie’s roles.”

“I’m Mark, obviously,” said Simon. “Jolene is Maureen, Harmony is Joanne, Clark is Collins, Francis is Angel. And you know that Robbie is Benny.”

“And Mimi?” Lilette asked.

“A new girl,” Jeremy said. “Well, new to the troupe. Piper.”

“It should have been you,” Simon said before he could stop himself. Jeremy glanced over at him. He could see Lilette start to frown and felt the sudden urge to keep talking, feeling his ears starting to go red. “Well, it should’ve! If you were here it would have been you on that stage with us.”

“You don’t know that, Si,” she said. Simon couldn’t read the expression on her face, whether it was upset or prideful. “It could have been anyone playing Mimi -”

“But it would have been you,” said Simon. “Everyone knows it. You would be…you would be perfect.” Beside him, Jeremy nodded.

On the computer screen, Lilette still looked unconvinced. “No,” she said. “I wouldn’t...I don’t know.” She fell silent for a moment, not meeting Simon’s eyes. “I wish it were me too,” she said quietly.

The three of them didn’t talk for a moment after that. He could hear Jeremy flipping through Simon’s script, which had been laying on the end table beside the couch. Lilette was glancing down at her phone, clearly just looking for a way to keep herself busy. After a few minutes, he heard Jeremy begin to hum under his breath, and, as if they had planned it, Lilette join him.

_“It’s nothing. They turned off my heat, and I’m just a little weak on my feet. Would you light my candle?”_

Simon looked up, meeting Lilette’s eyes through the screen. A small smile had started to grow on her face. He heard Jeremy’s voice beside him.

_“Nothing, your hair in the moonlight. You look familiar - can you make it?”_

The situation felt simultaneously familiar and completely strange. It almost felt like they weren’t separated at all, as if Simon were getting a peek into an alternate universe where Lilette had never moved away, where she had been cast as Mimi and Jeremy as Roger and Simon as Mark, and they were meeting up to run lines together. It felt so normal. It felt so right. Except for one thing.

Simon looked at Lilette, and then at Jeremy. They were the two people he loved most in the world. And yet still, Lilette knew nothing of Jeremy. She didn’t know about the secret that Simon was hiding, the secret that he still couldn’t bring himself to say out loud to anyone. He couldn’t say the word, not even to Jeremy. It felt like it got lodged in his throat every time he tried, choking him.

He was starting to get tired of hiding in the shadows, but he had no idea how to come into the light.

“ _I know I’ve seen you out and about, when I used to go out. Your candle’s out.”_

***

“ _I’m illin - I had it when I walked in the door. It was pure - is it on the floor?”_

Jolene couldn’t tell whose fault the performance was. Or maybe it wasn’t anyone’s fault at all. Maybe it just the fault of incompatible orientations and unfamiliarity with each other, and it would get better over time.

And yet, as she watched Jeremy follow Piper across the stage, she got the feeling that it wasn’t anything like that. Jeremy was a better actor than that, and she had never seen Piper act before - well, not technically, anyway - but it didn’t seem at all like her. Beside her, she could see Lexi frown and Clark furrow his brows, tilting his head at the stage. _So it’s not just me,_ Jolene thought. _Everyone notices._

Mr. Baer played the final chords of the song, Piper and Jeremy standing on opposite sides of the stage now. In front of the stage, Jolene could see Mr. Mazzu and Ms. Wolfe glance at each other. “...okay,” Mr. Mazzu said finally. “Great job, guys.” He didn’t elaborate. _That’s probably for the best,_ Jolene thought. “Um, can we move on to You’ll See?”

Clark leaned forwards. “Is it just me, or was that kind of awful?”

Francis elbowed him. “Don’t be mean.”

“He’s not being mean,” said Violet. “He’s right. They have no chemistry.”

Lexi shrugged. “Maybe it’ll get better,” she said. “We’ve only rehearsed this song, what, twice now? Give them some time.” She tapped Jolene’s shoulder. “You’ve been quiet. What do you think, Jo?”

Jolene blinked. “What?” She had gotten distracted when Piper passed by her as she exited the stage, her mind going completely blank. She’d managed not to turn her head to watch her as she went to sit down, but she still couldn’t get her out of her head.

“Light My Candle,” Lexi said. “What did you -”

She was interrupted by Ms. Wolfe’s voice. “Clark! Francis! Places!”

The two boys scrambled over the auditorium seats to get to the stage. Jolene was too distracted by them to notice the girl approaching her. “Hey,” Harmony said quietly. “Can we talk?”

“Um,” Jolene said, and then instantly wanted to kick herself. _Really, Jo? The girl you’ve been pining after for months and all you can say is “um”?_ “Sure. Do you want to…”

“Out in the hallway,” said Harmony. “I think we would be better if we, uh…” She trailed off, her eyes darting towards the door.

Jolene shrugged. “Okay.” She stood, ignoring the way Lexi mouthed _Get some_ at her as she followed Harmony out the door.

Harmony was leaning against the wall outside of the auditorium, nervously twirling a strand of hair. Jolene’s heart was beating at the pace of a hummingbird’s wings. “So, um,” she said. “What’s up?”

Harmony sighed. “You already know what’s up. Even if you won’t do anything to acknowledge it.”

Jolene raised her eyebrows. “Oh, really?” she said. But somewhere, deep down, she knew that Harmony was right. “What is it, then?”

“Piper.”

“What about her?” Jolene asked.

Harmony shook her head. “Don’t. Don’t do that.”

“Do _what_?”

“Pretend like everything’s fine!” Harmony took a step closer to Jolene. “Why do you think she auditioned, Jolene? What motivations would she have? I’ve seen the way she looks at you. And…” She trailed off. “And I’ve seen the way you look at her.”

“And why would you care? Are you jealous or something?” At the look at Harmony’s face Jolene instantly knew that she had gone too far, but she couldn’t stop herself from continuing. “Seriously. Leave me alone. I’m fine.”

“No, you _aren’t_ ,” Harmony said. “The girl I know would never have said something like that.”

“Well, maybe you don’t know me!” Jolene snapped. “That’s why we broke up. You keep trying to pretend like you know who I am, what I’m thinking, and I was tired of it.”

Harmony shook her head again, her brows furrowed. “Don’t you dare pretend like it was all my fault,” she said. “You wouldn’t even speak to me. You would close yourself off, you would shut down completely. And then you would pretend like nothing had even happened. So yeah, maybe you’re right. I didn’t know you. And if you ask me, that’s a pretty awful basis for a relationship.”

At some point the two of them had stepped even closer to each other, close enough to almost be touching. Jolene couldn’t stop her gaze from flicking down to Harmony’s lips. When she looked up, she saw that Harmony was looking back at her.

Harmony stepped away suddenly. “I have to rehearse,” she said tightly. Jolene didn’t say anything, just turned to watch her go. She could feel her hands shaking and forced herself to ignore it.

 _It’s all happening again,_ she thought.

***

Violet was sitting on the curb outside the auditorium doors when Lexi saw her. The sun had just started to dip in the sky and it shone from behind her, making it seem like she was outlined in gold. It reminded Lexi of something out of a movie - _close up on the beautiful yet mysterious yet perfect girl._

She shook her head. _Stop it,_ she told herself. _This isn’t a romance movie._ It wasn’t a movie at all. Movies had happy endings, not whatever she and Violet were going to have.

She pushed that thought out of her head. _Don’t. Don’t think about that._

She walked down the concrete stairs, approaching Violet where she was sitting on the sidewalk. “Hey,” she said.

Violet looked over at her, a smile forming on her face. “Hey,” she replied. “What are you still doing here?”

Lexi sat down next to Violet, resting her head on her knees. “I technically can’t get my drivers’ license for another few weeks,” she said. “So I’m waiting for my mom to get here. You?”

Violet shrugged. “I don’t know,” she said. “I kind of just wanted to chill, I guess.”

“I can leave if -” Lexi started to say, but Violet reached out, grabbing her hand.

“No,” she said. “Stay.”

Lexi smiled. “Okay,” she said.

For a few moments they just sat there in silence. Lexi expected Violet to let go of her hand, but she didn’t - not that she was complaining. Nearly everyone else had left by then, the parking lot almost completely empty. The only sounds were the cars passing by on the road, the two of them so far away from it that they’d look tiny and indistinguishable by any passerby.

“I saw you filming during rehearsal today,” Violet said suddenly.

Lexi nodded. “Yeah, I was,” she said. She didn’t usually bring her actual camera to school unless she had a class that called for it, so she had been using an app that she’d gotten for her phone. The quality of the videos wasn’t as good, but the effect was still the same. “Don’t worry,” she added. “I won’t use it for what I did last year.”

Violet laughed slightly, but she seemed distracted, like her mind was elsewhere. “This is kind of a weird question,” she said, “but why do you like it so much? Filmmaking, I mean.”

Lexi tilted her head, thinking. No one had ever asked her that question. The answer seemed so obvious, so obvious that she had a difficult time putting it into words. “I think that it’s because of the idea of capturing a moment in time,” she said finally. “Immortalizing a memory, sort of. That’s why I always film at rehearsal, or when I’m with any of you guys. They’re memories that I want to keep.”

Violet nodded. “That makes sense,” she said. “That’s the same thing that I think about when I draw.”

Lexi glanced over at her. Violet wasn’t looking back, her face curved in profile. “Have you ever drawn me?” she asked.

Violet finally looked back at her, smiling that secretive smile again. “Maybe,” she said quietly.

Lexi wanted to question her further, but she knew that Violet would just deflect it. She took her phone out of her pocket instead, opening her camera app. “What were you thinking about before I came out here?” she asked her.

Violet glanced over at her, laughing and covering her face when she saw the camera. “Come on, don’t. Put it away.”

“No one’s going to see it except for me,” Lexi said. “You know when I was talking about immortalizing memories earlier? You’re one of the memories that I want to keep. Please?”

Violet lowered her hand slowly and rolled her eyes, although the effect was killed by the smile still present on her face. “Fine,” she said. “I was thinking about...it’s kind of hard to put into words, actually.”

“Take your time,” Lexi said.

Violet tapped her fingers on the cold sidewalk. “If I had to put it into one word, I think it would be...identity, I guess.”

“What about it?”

Violet shrugged. “That’s even harder,” she said. “I’m better with pictures than words, you know that. Um, I guess I was thinking about who I am now, or how people see me now. And how that’s definitely going to change.”

“Who you are, or how you’re seen?”

“Yes. Both. I don’t know.” Violet sighed. “I think that’s why…” She looked over at Lexi. “Can you turn the camera off for this?”

Lexi nodded. “Of course,” she said. She pressed the stop recording button, turning her phone off and putting it back in her jacket pocket. “What is it?”

Violet bit her lip. “I think that’s why I don’t...that’s why I’m not sure about our relationship.” Lexi raised her eyebrows, opening her mouth to reply, but Violet cut her off. “It’s not that I want to break up,” she said quickly. “I definitely don’t. It’s just...I don’t know how to tell people about us without it...changing us. Changing me.”

Lexi leaned her head on Violet’s shoulder, and surprisingly, Violet didn’t push her away. “It won’t change anything,” she said. “You’ll still be the same you you’ve always been. Everyone will still see you the same way.”

Violet met her eyes. “Will they?” she asked.

Lexi looked away. “Yes,” she said, but she couldn’t shake the feeling that somewhere, deep down, she knew that she was wrong.

***

Clark had barely managed to get upstairs before the arguments began. They weren’t even that loud - they weren’t even yelling, more like really intensely talking - but the house still seemed to shake with the force of it.

He could never tell when the fighting would begin. It would seem to come out of nowhere, the most unexpected topics leading to sudden conflict. It had been the musical, this time. His mom had just gotten home, and Clark was in the kitchen with his dad and the twins, trying to concentrate on homework. His mom had asked how rehearsal went, following it up with a question specifically for Hannah - how she was doing. Kendra had snapped, asking why Hannah would be any different, and their mom snapped right back saying that she knew perfectly well why Hannah would be different, and that was all that Clark had let himself hear before he snuck out of the kitchen and up the stairs to his room.

The biggest problem with the arguments wasn’t that they happened. He couldn’t see a way that they wouldn’t. The problem was that he had no idea whose side to take. He’d take Hannah’s if he knew what her stance was, but she either couldn’t or wouldn’t speak up. He couldn’t blame her for it - if he was in her position, he’d do the exact same thing. Speaking was what had caused this whole disaster in the first place.

He flopped onto his bed, turning to stare at the wall. He heard the creak of the door hinges behind him and looked over his shoulder, fully expecting to see Hannah or even Kendra, but it was just the family cat, Misty. She jumped up beside Clark, gently headbutting his hand. “Mood,” he told her, petting her gently.

It had been ten minutes now - usually the arguments would start winding down right about now. Their parents would send Kendra to her room and talk to Hannah alone. On the worst days they would yell at her too, but they would typically just tell her how important it was to them that she try to mold herself into the daughter they wanted her to be and send her on her way. Sometimes Clark’s mom would even come talk to him. She was the only one who seemed to realize how much he hated the constant fighting. Whatever she said to him never helped. Usually she just said that Clark was so bothered by it because he had never truly “suffered” in his life - and then she didn’t seem to realize how much he hated the way that she said that. Clark could be hit by a car, his parents could divorce, the worst things in the world could happen, and he doubted that he would be any less pissed off at the way that people treated his sister.

Clark stood up, ignoring Misty as she meowed angrily at him, and walked over to his bedroom door. He didn’t even have to open it to hear his mother’s voice, stressing how important it was that Hannah practice the exercises that her speech therapist gave her. Clark sighed, leaning against the wall. It wasn’t stopping, it wasn’t even close. He looked at Misty. “Misty, if you think I should go downstairs, do nothing.”

Misty meowed, leaping off the bed and weaving past him. Clark rolled his eyes, pulling out his phone. There was only one person that he could bring himself to talk to now.

 **You** _(6:54pm): can I come over? my parents and the twins are at it again_

The response came almost instantly.

 **Francis** _(6:55pm): Yeah of course! I’m in the backyard, if you don’t want to go downstairs you can just go through my room :)_

Clark and his family had moved into the neighborhood the summer between fourth and fifth grade. The first thing that he had noticed was the close proximity to the house next door - the roof outside of his bedroom window sloped down, meeting the roof of the other house in the middle. The second thing was the boy that lived in that house next door. It had turned out that he and Francis were in the same class, and they were instantly inseparable. It hadn’t take them long to realize how easy it was to sneak into each other’s bedrooms - they just had to climb across their roofs and through the window. Either their parents didn’t notice or knew that they wouldn’t be able to stop them. It kind of reminded Clark of something that he’d seen in a rom-com. For bros. A bro-com. Whatever.

Francis had left his window unlocked, as he always did, so it was easy to get inside. He was quiet as he slipped out the door and down the hallway, past Thomas’s room where the door was shut tight. “Hey,” he said as he stepped out into the backyard.

Francis looked up from where he was laying on the ground with a textbook unopened next to him. “Hey,” he said. “What’s up?”

Clark shrugged, going to sit down next to him. “What are you doing?”

“Precalc homework.”

“You look like you’re just lying here.”

“I’m telling myself that I’m doing precalc homework so I feel more successful.”

“That’s more like it.”

Clark looked over at his own house. He couldn’t see much over the fence, but he could still spot movement through the kitchen windows. Next to him, Francis had sat up, and he grabbed his hand, intertwining their fingers. “What’s going on?” he asked.

Clark rolled his eyes. “The usual stuff. My parents are blaming Hannah for having a speech impairment. Kendra’s yelling at them and not letting Hannah speak for herself. And I have no idea whose side to take.”

“Not to be rude, but it kind of sounds like you’ve made your decision.”

Clark shrugged. “I don’t know. I want Hannah to be treated like everyone else. But she won’t ever be as long as…”

Francis nodded. “I get it.” And Clark knew that he did. No one ever understood him like Francis did. He just wished that he could understand Francis as easily.

Francis cleared his throat. “Um, do you want to…” He flicked his eyes up to where Clark knew his room was, and knew instantly what he was asking. But as appealing as the idea of Francis’s lips on his neck and his hands under his shirt sounded, he couldn’t get the thought of his family arguing next door out of his mind.

He shook his head. “I kind of just want to get out of here.”

Francis smiled. “Okay.”

He took his phone out of his jacket pocket, sending a quick text to someone - probably Thomas. Clark looked up at Francis’s house - he could never wrap his head around how empty it usually was, just Francis and Thomas. “Do you ever get lonely here?” he asked.

Francis looked taken aback for a second, but then shook his head. “Why would I when I’ve got you?”

They ended up at a playground just outside of the town square, abandoned as the weather started to get colder in late September. The sun had just started to set, the sky starting to gain streaks of pink and orange and gold. They were sitting on the swings, Francis moving just enough for the swing to go back and forth slightly, Clark staying completely still. He could hear Francis fishing through his pocket for something, and after a moment, found it. “Do you want to listen to anything?” he asked.

“Sure.” Francis passed him an AirPod, and, even after Clark took it, their hands stayed touching. “Of course _you_ have AirPods,” Clark said, just to break the silence.

Francis laughed. Clark wasn’t sure which one of them had intertwined their fingers, but he certainly wasn’t going to complain about it. _Nothing gay about this,_ he told himself. _Just holding hands and sharing AirPods with your bro._

The song that played through the AirPods was so familiar that it was jarring. He jerked his head, staring over at Francis. “Is this the rehearsal track?”

“Maybe.”

“How the hell did you even get this?”

“They’re on YouTube, it’s not that illegal.” Francis looked down at his phone. “I can shuffle it again if you want -”

Clark shook his head. “Keep it on.”

He looked at the ground for a moment, listening to the beats filling his ears. He dragged his foot through the dirt, staring at the lines that it formed. And then there was a new sound, unfamiliar and familiar at the same time.

“ _Live in my house, I’ll be your shelter. Just pay me back with one thousand kisses.”_

Clark stilled. Out of the corner of his eye, he glanced at Francis, and felt a shiver go down his spine when he saw that Francis was looking back at him.

“ _Be my lover, and I’ll cover you.”_

Francis raised his eyebrows at him, and Clark realized with a jolt that this was his part. He came in just a few seconds too late, rolling his eyes at Francis’s laugh.

“... _Don’t got much baggage to lay at your feet. But sweet kisses I’ve got to spare, I’ll be there, and I’ll cover you.”_

Francis launched himself off of the swing, coming over to Clark and grabbing his hands, pulling him to his feet. Clark shook his head, laughing. “No way.”

“Yes. Come on, who’s going to see?”

“ _We_ will. I barely know the choreography, I don’t have a mind for it like you do -”

“Just follow me. It’s not like I know it that well either.” _Yes, you do,_ Clark thought. Francis hadn’t danced seriously since they were in eighth grade, but he was still much better at it than anyone else that Clark knew, regardless of whether or not he realized it. He opened his mouth, wanting to tell him, but Francis had started singing again and every thought seemed to disappear from Clark’s head. He couldn’t help but join in.

“ _I think they meant it when they said you can’t buy love. Now I know you can rent it, a new lease, you are my love…”_

There was something amazing about it. Here Clark was, dancing in an empty playground, singing a romantic duet with the most beautiful boy he had ever met, and he didn’t even care who saw. It didn’t even feel real. It felt like the two of them were in their own universe, far away from everything else that had happened or would happen in their lives.

They ended up standing underneath the jungle gym, the sun casting stripes across their faces in shadow. The music was still playing in Clark’s ear, but he had long since trailed off. He couldn’t take his eyes off of Francis. In this light, he didn’t even look human - he looked like an angel, or something equally as beautiful. Francis was staring at him, too, his dark eyes glazed over, but Clark had no idea what he was thinking.

And then, suddenly, Francis leaned in and kissed him.

Clark couldn’t stop himself from kissing back, and he wouldn’t have if he’d had the choice. Either way, it was over as soon as it began. They touched their foreheads together when they pulled away, Francis’s arms still looped around Clark’s neck. And then Clark started laughing, and Francis did too, and they were just standing there together, laughing at nothing.

It was the first time they had really kissed, kissed without anything behind it, without it being a precursor to sex or anything else. It was the kind of kiss that felt real. It was the kind of kiss that made Clark realize it.

 _Shit,_ Clark thought. _I’m in love with him._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> recommended listening: vanilla twilight - owl city | chasing fire - lauv | the green and the town - AJR  
> talk to me on twitter (@annileej) and tumblr (@glorioussimon)!!


	4. all that sweat and blood

**Si <3 ** _ (1:58pm): Can we talk after rehearsal today? I miss you. _

“What did you mean you missed me?” Jeremy asked Simon that evening. They still weren’t the only ones in the auditorium - Mr. Mazzu and Ms. Wolfe had headed to the office to discuss something, but a few troupe members were still packing up their things. Jeremy stood slightly back from Simon, far away for them to just be passing by each other to a casual onlooker, speaking just loud enough for only Simon to hear him. “You see me every day.”

Simon shrugged. “Yeah, I  _ see _ you,” he said. “But I don’t really get to...be with you, you know?”

Jeremy nodded. “I get it.” 

He watched as Simon glanced around the auditorium. At some point, the other kids had slowly trickled out, Skylar, the freshman playing Gordon, being the last to leave. Simon stepped closer to him, and Jeremy felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end at their close proximity. Simon wrapped his arms around his neck, pulling him closer until they were pressed together completely, and kissed him, softly, slowly.

It almost hurt to pull away. Jeremy leaned his forehead against Simon’s, feeling the other boy’s breathing against his lips. “Come over to my place tomorrow,” he whispered. “Zach is working, he won’t be home. It’ll only be us. We can do whatever you want to do or don’t want to do. We’ll finally get to be alone together.”

A slow smile had started to spread across Simon’s face. “That sounds perfect,” he said softly. He leaned in, about to kiss Jeremy again, but suddenly, a loud clash echoed throughout the theater. Simon pulled away quicker than Jeremy thought possible, stepping backwards.

“What the hell was that?” Jeremy asked. Simon shrugged, glancing at a point somewhere above Jeremy’s head. Jeremy followed his gaze up to the lighting booth, but he couldn’t see anyone up there, just the darkness and dust of a place long-abandoned.

“I think I’m going to head home,” Simon said quietly, his voice small.

Jeremy looked back at him, but Simon wouldn’t meet his eyes. “Hey,” he said. He wanted to step closer, touch Simon’s cheek, his hand, but he knew that Simon wouldn’t want that, not now. “Are you alright?”

“I’m fine,” Simon said. “I just...I need to go. I’ll see you tomorrow.” 

Jeremy nodded. “See you,” he said. He picked up his backpack off of one of the seats, heading for the door. He expected Simon to be following him, but when he glanced back over his shoulder, Simon hadn’t moved. “Hey, are you coming?”

“In a minute,” Simon said. He seemed distant, his thoughts somewhere else, somewhere other than the auditorium. 

“Okay,” Jeremy said.  _ I love you,  _ he wanted to add. He barely managed to bite back the words, but he hoped beyond hoping that somehow, Simon still knew that he meant them. He turned on his heel, leaving Simon behind, standing completely alone in the dark theater. 

***

Simon had never quite realized how intimidating the auditorium was when it was empty, dark and huge with every step he took echoing throughout the room. He pulled out his phone, turning on the flashlight. He suddenly remembered one of the rehearsals for Spring Awakening, the one where Mr. Mazzu hadn’t listened to, well, anyone, and the spotlight had gone out. Despite the absence of the light, the auditorium hadn’t felt nearly as large them. Maybe it was because Lilette had been with him. 

He pushed away his thoughts, aiming his flashlight up at the lighting booth. He didn’t hear a sound, but could just barely see movement, someone ducking down, through the reflection of the light back into his eyes. “Hello?” he called. “Is anyone…” He trailed off. If someone was truly hiding up there, there was no way that they’d respond to his calls. It was the same logic as people calling out in the horror movies that his parents didn’t know that he watched.

Simon put his phone down and walked down the aisles, stepping out into the hallway. It was more well-lit here, the fluorescent lights on the ceiling contrasting with the darkness outside. Everything felt eerie, just slightly off. He kept one hand on the wall as he walked down the hallway, waiting to come into contact with that one specific doorknob. He knew that Mr. Mazzu and Ms. Wolfe never kept the door locked, and it turned easily beneath his hand.

He rarely went into the lighting booth - he never really had a reason to. He turned his flashlight back on, shining it around, but his eyes had already adjusted enough to know exactly who was leaning against the opposite wall.

“Skylar.” It wasn’t a question. It was a statement.

Simon heard the freshman sigh. “There’s a light switch behind you, you know,” he said. 

Simon reached behind him, flicking on the light. He could see everything now - the sleeping bag rolled up on the ground, the large backpack pushed up against one of the walls, and, most importantly, the boy standing across from him. How thin he looked. How hollow his cheeks were. The glazed look in his hazel eyes.

“What the hell is this?” Simon blurted out.

For the first time, Skylar met his eyes. “What does it look like to you?” he asked.

“You’re avoiding the question,” Simon said. He knew that method - distracting a question with another question. He’d used it thousands of times. “Skylar, this is serious, are you…” He trailed off, not knowing how to finish the statement.  _ Okay? Living? Homeless?  _

“I’m not homeless,” Skylar said suddenly. “Not technically, anyway. I can go home if I want. If I try hard enough.”

“Okay,” Simon said after a moment. “But then why are you…” He waved his hand vaguely. “Here?”

“It’s better than anywhere else,” he said. He walked over to the window, looking down over the stage. He wasn’t facing Simon, but he could still see Skylar’s reflection in the dark glass. “I saw you, you know,” Skylar said to his own mirror image.

Simon frowned. “Me? What do you mean?”

“I _ mean _ that I saw you kiss Jeremy.”

For a moment, the world went white. Simon’s blood rushed in his ears, his heartbeat pulsing. “No,” he managed to say. “That didn’t...I didn’t…”

Through the glass, Simon could see Skylar roll his eyes. “Don’t play dumb,” he said. “It was already obvious. The way you look at him...well, unless you and I interpreted Rent a lot differently, it’s not how Mark would typically look at Roger.”

“Is it that obvious?” Simon choked out. His mind was racing, his thoughts a tornado in his head. He reached out, steadying himself with a hand on the wall. 

Skylar turned, looking at him. He shook his head. “I’m observant,” he said. “I have to be. I don’t think that anyone else knows.”

Simon’s throat loosened, just a bit. He stood up straighter. “You can’t tell anyone about this, Skylar,” he said. “I’m serious. You can’t.”

Skylar nodded. “Of course,” he said. “I won’t tell a soul. That is, if you don’t tell anyone about...well, this.”

It took a moment for Skylar’s words to set in, and another for Simon to find a way to respond to them. “Are you joking?”

Skylar shook his head. “Why would I joke about something like this?”

“That’s...oh my god, Skylar. You’re insane.”

Skylar glared at him. “No. I know what I have to do to survive.” He took a step closer to Simon. “Look. I wouldn’t do this if I didn’t have to. If your parents are anything like mine, I know that that could put you...well, it could put you  _ here _ .”

Simon’s eyes widened. “Are you saying that…” He couldn’t finish the sentence. He couldn’t force himself to. Luckily, Skylar knew what he was trying to say.

“I’m saying that I can’t risk my parents knowing where I am,” Skylar said. He didn’t snap. He didn’t yell. He just sounded tired. “They’d try to...fix me. Send me to conversion therapy or something. That’s why I can’t risk you telling about this. I really am sorry, Simon. It’s the only way.”

Simon shook his head weakly. “No, it isn’t,” he said. “You could tell Ms. Wolfe or Mr. Mazzu, get help -”

“I  _ can’t _ ,” Skylar said. “Don’t you see? My parents don’t want me the way I am. And if they don’t want me for me, I don’t want them. If I tell anyone, they’ll just try to send me back home. And if  _ you  _ tell anyone, they’ll do the same thing.” He sighed, leaning back against the wall. “I’ll get a job when I turn sixteen,” he said. “I’ll save up enough to get out of here. I’ll be okay.” It sounded as if he was reciting a plan that he’d devoted to memory, a mantra that he relied on to get him through the worst times. Simon clenched his fists, feeling a shiver go down his spine.

“You can come stay with me,” he said - a last-ditch effort, one final wild attempt. 

He was almost relieved when Skylar shook his head. “No way,” he said. “If your reaction to me mentioning you and Jeremy was that strong...your parents definitely wouldn’t want me in their house.”

Simon didn’t want to admit that he was right. “Fine,” he said instead. “I’ll...I’ll bring you food and stuff. Clothes. Money. Whatever you need.”

Skylar had turned away from him again. “You don’t know what you’re promising,” he said.

“I want to help, Skylar,” Simon said. “Just...please, just let me.”

Skylar didn’t look at him, but Simon could see him nod. “Fine,” he said. “And you won’t tell?”

Simon shook his head. “Not a soul.” Not with Skylar holding Simon’s own secrets over his head like a star about to explode. 

“Good,” Skylar said. He met Simon’s eyes through the glass. “Goodnight, Simon,” he said. 

It was clear that this was his was of kicking Simon out, of shutting him out of his mind and his secrets and becoming the reserved boy that Simon knew at rehearsals. Simon knew the routine well. “Goodnight, Skylar,” he said.

He turned towards the door, but couldn’t stop himself from looking over his shoulder again. From where he was standing, his reflection overlapped almost perfectly with Skylar’s - despite his dark hair and eyes contrasting with Skylar’s light, it looked almost as if they were one person.

Simon looked away quickly, shutting the door behind him.

***

Harmony wished that there were textbooks on how to keep secrets. It might make her life easier if it was just something she could study and study until she finally nailed it. But instead she had to fumble her way through it, hoping that nobody asked her questions, and if they did, she had to awkwardly attempt to brush them off. It wasn’t as hard with her mom - she didn’t ask as much of her, just wanted to know that Harmony was okay and not breaking any laws. With her dad, however, it wasn’t nearly as easy.

She’d managed to sneak past him today - when he asked her where she’d gone after school at dinner, she’d say that she was at the library or something. He’d probably like that, she thought. Part of her wondered how long she’d be able to keep it up. The rest of her didn’t want to think about it.

Harmony was in her bedroom, her laptop open in front of her, when she heard her door open. She glanced over her shoulder. “What?”

Her older sister, leaning against the doorframe, raised her eyebrows. “Wow. Nice greeting.”

Harmony looked back at the computer screen. “Just tell me what you need,” she said. “I have to get this essay done by midnight.”

She heard Isabelle coming up behind her, sitting down on her bed. “When did you get the assignment?”

“Tuesday. Why?”

“It’s just kind of weird that you would leave it so late,” Isabelle remarked. “It doesn’t seem like something you would do.”

“Yeah, because I’m not like you, Bella,” Harmony said. She switched her browser from a Google Drive document to a New Tab page. “I can’t write an A-plus paper in an hour.”

“Who said that I could?” Isabelle said. 

Harmony rolled her eyes despite knowing that Isabelle couldn’t see her. “Prior experience?”

Isabelle was silent for a moment. “You know, you never said why you were leaving it so late,” she said finally. “Did you have rehearsal after school?”

For the first time since Isabelle had entered the room, Harmony turned, meeting her eyes. “How did you know about that?” She hadn’t even told Isabelle that she had auditioned, much less gotten a role. She hadn’t planned on letting her find out.

“Piper told me,” said Isabelle. Harmony could feel her blood run cold. She didn’t even have to say anything for Isabelle to know exactly how she felt. “Come on,” she said. “Don’t be like that. Piper’s my friend, she didn’t even realize that I didn’t know.”

“Yeah,” Harmony said. “I’m  _ sure _ she didn’t.”

Isabelle sighed. “Why are you being such a bitch? You used to be completely fine with her, what the hell changed?”

“I’m _ not  _ being a bitch. It’s just...she’s…” Harmony trailed off. She had no idea how to put it into words. She had no idea if she even could without saying something that she didn’t want to. “I don’t know. Just...don’t tell Dad about this, okay?”

Isabelle frowned, but nodded. “Fine,” she said. “It’s your funeral, I guess.”

“Thank you,” Harmony said. “Really. Is there anything else, or can I write my essay now?”

Isabelle smirked. “It’s kind of funny how you’re too polite to ask me to get the fuck out of your room.”

“Do you want me to tell you to get the fuck out of my room? Then fine. Get the fuck out of my room.”

“Okay, okay.” Isabelle stood, backing out of the room. “Dad said to tell you that dinner’s in ten minutes. You’d better think of a good excuse before then.” 

“I’ve already got one.”

Isabelle grinned. “I knew you would.” And then she was gone, leaving Harmony alone with her thoughts.

She leaned back in her desk chair, staring at the laptop screen. The cursor was blinking on the blank page, the flashes almost, but not quite, in time with her heartbeat. Her mind was racing. She couldn’t stop thinking about what Isabelle had told her. About Piper. About Jolene.

Harmony could still remember the day when she first met Piper, remember it so vividly that it was almost eerie. It was in her freshman year, after one of the first rehearsals for the musical on one of the many occasions when everyone had decided to go grab dinner at Volpe’s rather than bother with it at home. Harmony had been talking to Jolene when a girl, tall with long pale brown hair and freckles across her face, had approached them. Jolene had smiled at her, although it hadn’t quite reached her eyes, and introduced her as Piper Perez. Her girlfriend.

At first, Harmony had thought that the way that she thought about Piper was just because of her crush on Jolene. It would explain those instant feelings that she had about her, the instant pit that seemed to open in the bottom of her stomach whenever she saw her. But eventually something changed. Harmony’s eyes opened, and she saw more. She saw the way that Jolene seemed to close off when she was with Piper, or even just texting her while she was with Harmony or anyone else. She saw the way that Jolene texted Harmony less and less after Piper had met her. Worst of all, she’d overheard that conversation between Jolene and Piper on her way to biology class one morning, the one that she knew she wasn’t supposed to know about. The one where Piper had told Jolene to stop talking to Harmony and the other kids in the troupe, that she’d be checking her phone, checking her social media accounts. It felt like the way Piper had spoken was burned into Harmony’s mind - “ _ You know I’d die without you, right, Jo?”  _ she had said.

It had taken Harmony weeks to bring it up with Jolene. It had taken Jolene weeks more to admit that Harmony was right, that something was wrong. And it had taken even longer for Jolene to work up the courage to break it off with Piper. 

“Harmony!”

Harmony jumped, startled out of her thoughts. She hadn’t realized how much time had passed - dinner would definitely be ready by now, and her essay was still blank. She sighed, glancing down at her phone where it sat on the desk next to her laptop. Every bone in her body itched to call Jolene. There wasn’t even anything that she wanted to talk to her about, not really. She just wanted to hear her voice.

Her dad called her name again, a hint of impatience creeping into his tone. Harmony pushed away from the table, standing up. She looked back at her computer, feeling a pang of guilt at the sight of the blank document.

_ That’s going to be a really crappy essay,  _ she thought.

***

Francis knew in the back of his mind that he should probably be paying attention to Mr. Mazzu and Ms. Wolfe, but he couldn’t bring himself to. At some point Clark had leaned his head on his shoulder and he couldn’t even figure out how to breathe normally anymore. 

The first time that they had hooked up, Francis had made a promise to himself -  _ don’t fall for him.  _ His life was complicated enough without having to deal with being into a straight guy. And then he’d made the mistake of kissing him on the playground those few weeks ago, and everything had changed. He told himself that he didn’t know why he had done it, that he’d gotten wrapped up in the song, but he knew that he was lying to himself.

The auditorium doors slammed open suddenly, jolting Francis out of his thoughts. At first he didn’t even recognize the boy who had entered, the sight of him somehow familiar and unfamiliar at the same time. He could feel Clark sit up next to him. “Is that…?”

“Thomas!” Mr. Mazzu said. He had turned around to acknowledge him, and therefore didn’t see Francis mouth  _ What are you doing here?  _ at his brother. Thomas either didn’t see him or ignored him. “Put your stuff down wherever,” Mr. Mazzu continued. He turned back to the stage, speaking to the troupe. “Guys, this is Thomas Russo. He’ll be doing lights for us this year.”

“You got a replacement Maashous?” Michael asked. “A replaashous, if you will?

Mr. Mazzu shrugged. “We kind of had to,” he said. “No one knew the lighting system like he did, but it doesn’t seem like he’ll be coming back to help us this year. He seems pretty happy with his mother.” 

Out of the corner of his eye, Francis could have sworn that he saw Jeremy frown.

“Thomas, can you go wait out in the hallway for me?” Mr. Mazzu said over his shoulder. “I’ll come talk to you once I finish with these guys.” Thomas nodded, disappearing out through the doors. Mr. Mazzu kept talking, but it was even harder for Francis to concentrate than he had been. Finally, Ms. Wolfe called for a break, and Francis stood up, murmuring a  _ be right back  _ to Clark, and heading out into the hallway. The band room wasn’t far from the auditorium, and he could hear them rehearsing, playing the first few bars of  _ I Should Tell You  _ before Mr. Baer cut them off abruptly, and then starting over again and again and again. And there was Thomas, walking down the hallway with his back to Francis.

“Hey!” he called. He could see Thomas stop, but he didn’t turn around, instead staying still in the middle of the hallway. Francis took a step closer. “How long has this been a thing?”

“Since Ms. Wolfe cornered me after health and told me that I had to do it,” said Thomas without looking at him. “Don’t worry. I’ll stay away from you.”

Francis frowned. “You don’t have to do that.”

Thomas shrugged. “Yeah,” he said. “I kind of do.” He hesitated for a moment. Francis could see the tension in his posture, the way that he held himself in a completely straight line. “You’re a damn good actor, you know.”

“Thank you,” Francis said, surprised. Thomas wasn’t usually one to give compliments, especially to him.

“That wasn’t a compliment,” said Thomas. 

Francis suppressed the shiver that wanted to go down his spine. Thomas had read his mind like that several times before, but it never failed to surprise him. “What do you mean?”

For the first time, Thomas turned around, meeting his eyes. He looked just like he always did - closed off, almost emotionless. This was the closest he’d ever really come to opening up to Francis, not since...well, ever. And yet Francis knew that at any time, he could just shut down again.

“I mean that you’re a different person around them,” Thomas said finally. “Your friends, I mean. And if I’m being honest, I don’t really like the person that you become.” 

Francis glanced at Thomas - the defiant way that he stood, the cold, clipped tone in his voice. “You’re trying to provoke me,” he said. It wasn’t a question, but Francis wished that it was. “What the hell, Tom? What do you even want?”

“I want you to be fucking real for once in your life.” Thomas took a step closer to him, and Francis met his stare head-on. “You’ve acted different ever since Dad -”

“Well, what else am I supposed to do?”

“Maybe you could stop pretending like things are the same as they always were!”

“So am I acting different or am I acting the same?” Francis snapped. For all the time that it had been just him and Thomas, they had rarely spoken to each other, not about anything important. Maybe this was why - this clash that had always been inevitable.

“I…” Thomas sighed, adjusting his glasses nervously. “I don’t even know, okay? I just...I want to -”

But what he wanted, Francis never found out. He heard the auditorium door slam open behind him and he turned to see Mr. Mazzu coming out into the hallway. “Hey, Francis,” he said offhandedly. He glanced over Francis’s shoulder, to where Thomas was standing. “Thomas, I was thinking I could show you how the lighting equipment works now.”

Francis looked over at Thomas. He was nodding, picking up his backpack off of the floor. He walked past Francis, heading back into the auditorium. Francis couldn’t stop himself from saying something as Thomas walked by - “Talk to me again when you’ve figured out what the fuck you want.”

Thomas stopped suddenly, looking back at Francis. He expected him to glare at him, or say something back, but instead he just looked exhausted, his shoulders slumping and his eyes unfocused. He simply stood there for a moment, staring at Francis. Francis could hardly bring himself to meet his eyes. He’d known that he’d gone too far the instant the words had left his mouth, but it was too late for him to do anything about it now.

Francis blinked and Thomas was gone, disappearing into the auditorium. He sighed, leaning against the wall. “Shit,” he said under his breath.

“Language,” said Mr. Mazzu.

Francis jumped; he had forgotten that he was there. He couldn’t help but wonder if Mr. Mazzu had overheard what he had said, if he understood what he meant by it. “Sorry,” he said.

Despite not looking directly at Mr. Mazzu, he could still feel his eyes on him. “Are you alright?” he asked. “You seem shaken up.”

Francis shrugged. “Yeah,” he said. “I’m fine. It’s just - brothers. You know?”

Mr. Mazzu nodded. “Trust me, I get it. Siblings have a special way of getting under your skin.”

_ You don’t know the half of it,  _ Francis thought.

***

Violet wasn’t sure when it had started raining, but it didn’t seem like it was ever going to stop. She held her bag over her head as she climbed out of her car, trying to protect herself and the letters and papers she had gathered from the mailbox from it, but she still felt soaked when she got in the door. She hung her jacket on a doorknob, hoping that it would dry out quickly.

Rehearsal had run later than usual tonight - she had half expected one of her parents to beat her home, but as of now, she was alone in the house. Her mother, an art history professor, was probably on her way home already, but there was no telling when her father would finish up with the drivers’ ed class he was teaching. She pulled up the Spotify app on her phone, pressing shuffle on the first playlist she could find. An instrumental piece, familiar and unfamiliar at the same time, began to play, echoing throughout the house. She knew that she’d have to turn it off in a few minutes when her parents got home, but she couldn’t stand the house when it was completely silent. 

She flicked on a light switch, walking down the hall to the kitchen. The setting sun glared off of the picture frames on the walls, most containing family photos, but some being Violet’s own artwork, paintings that had been in local art shows or that she’d submitted to contests online. Her parents had always been proud of her work, sometimes overwhelmingly so. And yet Violet knew that she wouldn’t trade them for the world.

She sat down at the kitchen counter, flipping through the mail. She knew that she should start making dinner or something, but right now, all she wanted was to chill. The mail was the same as it always was - bills, expired magazine subscriptions. And then at the bottom of the pile - something else.

Violet thought that she was seeing things at first. It took a double-take - no, a triple-take - for it to sink in. 

She’d applied to a ton of art schools over the summer, wanting to get the applications done as quickly as possible so she could put them out of her mind. It hadn’t worked. If anything, it had just made her anxieties even worse, and her anticipation even greater. Change was both her greatest fear and her greatest wish. She wanted something to break up the monotony of high school life, something to do, somewhere to go. An opportunity to break out, an opportunity to be bigger. And now that opportunity might be right here in her hands.

She’d read the return address countless times now, but she read it again -  _ Savannah College of Art and Design.  _ It had been her dream school since the summer before junior year when she’d managed to convince her parents to let her participate in their summer program. She hadn’t expected them to get back to her so quickly. She’d half-expected them to not get back to her at all - just ignore her application entirely, think  _ No, sorry, you’re not right for this school  _ and let her portfolio gather dust somewhere. She hadn’t even bothered checking her email - they’d probably emailed her about a change in her admissions status, but she hadn’t even noticed.

She knew that her parents would want her to wait for them to get home before she opened the letter, but she couldn’t bring herself to wait any longer. Her hands shook as she opened the envelope. She was surprised that she didn’t rip it or give herself a paper cut.

Violet had barely read the first paragraph before she nearly dropped the letter onto the floor.

And there it was. Finally, it had really, truly sunk in - she wouldn’t be in Stanton next year. Stanton High School would continue without her. And she would continue without it. She wasn’t sure whether it thrilled or terrified her.

In the back of her mind, she thought that she should tell someone. Her parents would want to know, of course, but this felt too big to just text it to them. Francis - she hadn’t even told him that she was applying, but she wouldn’t be surprised if he’d figured it out. 

Lexi.

Distantly, Violet heard the door open. “Violet?” her mom called. “You home, honey?”

“Yeah,” she managed to say. “I’m here - I’m in the kitchen. I’ve got something to show you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> recommended listening: bad liar - imagine dragons | cave in - owl city | growing old on bleecker street - ajr  
> talk to me on twitter @annileej and tumblr @glorioussimon!!


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